How to implement a keyboard for user input in VR with MetaXR?

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Hi everyone,

I’m working on a VR project in Unreal Engine 5 with MetaXR (Quest 2/3) and I need to implement a keyboard for user text input.

I tried using Enable Keyboard Overlays for Text Input with Unreal Engine following the official documentation:
:backhand_index_pointing_right: Meta Docs – Keyboard Overlays

I went through the entire setup process described there. However, according to this forum thread:
:backhand_index_pointing_right: Quest 2 virtual keyboard not working

That matches my experience: the keyboard doesn’t appear in VR Preview, only (apparently) when deployed to the device.

Additionally, when I try to trigger the keyboard in VR Preview, my widget freezes — I can see the text cursor blinking in the editable text, but the keyboard doesn’t show up, and I can’t close the widget anymore. The only way to exit is to stop the Preview entirely.

So my questions are:

  • Is there any way to properly use the Meta virtual keyboard inside Unreal (including VR Preview), or is it strictly limited to packaged builds on the headset?

  • If not, is the recommended approach to build a custom keyboard widget in UMG/Blueprints instead of relying on Meta’s native keyboard?

I’d really appreciate advice from anyone who has already implemented text input in VR with MetaXR. Should I wait for the official overlay to work properly, or just go ahead and build my own custom solution?

Thanks in advance!

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I’ve found it fairly easy to build a custom on-screen keyboard with Widget Blueprints following this YouTube tutorial: